Break me open and box me in
by PlainJaneDoe
Summary: James Moriarty was a man of simple pleasures and expensive tastes. Although he led a lavish and complex lifestyle, his needs for contentment were simple: Vivienne Westwood, strong coffee, Semtex, expensive soap and Sebastian Moran.


James Moriarty was a man of simple pleasures and expensive tastes. Although he led a lavish and complex lifestyle, his needs for contentment were simple: Vivienne Westwood, strong coffee, Semtex, expensive soap and Sebastian Moran.

However, as time passed, Jim found his needs simplifying even further. He began to realise that although a tailored suit made him look menacing, Seb made him _feel_ menacing. Where strong coffee woke him up, Seb made him feel _alive_. Whilst semtex was satisfying enough, Sebastian was the real explosive presence in his life, and as for expensive soap? Who needed soap when you were flat on your back being tongued all over by a man who couldn't care whether you were fresh out the shower or post-murder bloodied.

Despite the fact that all of this made Jim feel quite lovely, it also set itself as a dull ache of unease in his stomach that flared up whenever he had time to catch his breath and really think about what he was getting himself into. This wasn't really what he did. It wasn't _him_. It didn't come with the persona, to rely on someone so sincerely. Because he did rely on Seb now. Everything he did, he did with Sebastian in mind. Everything he once enjoyed independently, he could no longer do alone. All his simple pleasures diminished one by one until he was left with just a single man who could cater to everything he ever needed. Whose brassiness seemed to sparkle brighter every day, smug and confident and horribly sexy and it just made Jim feel… Weirdly pleasant, if a little horrified at the same time.

As time had passed, Sebastian had settled into his role as Jim's right hand man and flourished. He grew to fill the shape of the henchman that Jim needed at the time, then learned how to expand his confines and become more. Jim had watched it all in awe but said nothing, all the while more than aware of how impressed he was internally and how the ache in his chest seemed to burn his ribs with the force of it every time he observed Sebastian doing something a little bit more than outlined in his mission brief. Something just for Jim that Jim would like that would make Jim happy. An extra bullet wound here, a little intricate torture there, an extra couple of hours poured into a job just to perfect a kill exactly to Jim's tastes, tastes Sebastian had picked up on through observations alone.

Jim wasn't used to someone going above and beyond the call of duty. He was used to people trying too hard. He was used to people sucking up to him. He was used to people bending over backwards to please him because they craved the safety found within his approval. He wasn't used to people tailoring murders to his refined tastes _just because._ Not because of selfishness, not because of greed, but just _because_. Because it made him _happy_. And it _did_ make him happy, as much as Jim was loathe to admit it.

It was because of this that Jim, much to his own displeasure, had become more and more amiable to Sebastian's increasing cockiness. When Seb used to scan Jim intensely for a sign he could touch him, pry with curious eyes, ask with hesitant twitches, he now just slipped his arms around Jim's waist whilst he was stood in the Kitchen drinking his morning coffee, reading the paper over his shoulder and commenting on articles that took his interest. Pointing and distracting and pressing kisses to his jaw and biting his ear lobe and… It was all very different. It made Jim angry whilst at the same time it made him melt a bit and he _hated_ all this sappy shit usually, but he kind of liked it when it was Seb. Just a bit.

So he let it happen with the barest of sighs and hoped that Sebastian would never notice that he waited in the same spot every morning now, never realise that he leaned back into him every time and actually enjoyed his warmth, and would never _ever_ say a _word_ to anyone about any of this because if London ever found out that James Moriarty had gone soft, he'd never live it down.

He couldn't pinpoint the exact moment where Sebastian had grown from tentative henchman to confident boyfriend figure. It was almost as if Seb had had a realisation overnight in which he analysed Jim in a very _Jim_ fashion and discovered that Jim was actually painfully in something or other with him, and that put him in a minor position of power that left him free to push his luck and test their boundaries without fear of the fact that Jim might sever one of his fingers.

Jim wasn't sure he was 100% comfortable with the fact that Sebastian was slowly beginning to learn his bones. Sometimes when he was in bed, tipped on his side and watching Seb's breathing level, he let his mind wander. Tonight was one such night. He thought about this 'position of power' that he had, in fact, handed to Sebastian without even really realising and he wondered whether Sebastian actually realised this himself and whether he'd ever exploit it. It hurt a bit to think about, especially given the fact that in recent months Jim had never actually been so open with _anyone_ and he sincerely hoped that this wasn't just some long winded ploy to bring him down.

As if reading his thoughts, Sebastian suddenly rolled from his position on his back, pressing their chests together before gently pushing Jim onto his back and lying on top of him, snaking his hands down under the small of his back and resting his face on his collarbones, sighing sleepily whilst drawing lazy shapes into Jim's back as he drifted off to sleep.

Jim lay frozen for long moments, blinking up into the darkness, eyebrows drawn together in a pleasant kind of confusion before hesitantly draping his arms around Sebastian's shoulders and coming to a shaky conclusion that maybe this was real for once, and maybe he should stop searching for the point in which it would all collapse around him. Because maybe this time there wouldn't be one.


End file.
